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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28247205">The first of his commandments</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/eldritcher/pseuds/eldritcher'>eldritcher</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Chorale [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Belonging, Christmas Special, Family, Friendship, Gen, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 18:27:04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>15,728</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28247205</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/eldritcher/pseuds/eldritcher</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Celebrimbor thaws, and finds his level.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Celebrimbor | Telperinquar &amp; Ereinion Gil-galad, Celebrimbor | Telperinquar &amp; Fëanor | Curufinwë, Celebrimbor | Telperinquar &amp; Galadriel | Artanis</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Chorale [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2022304</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>The Song of Sunset AU</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The first of his commandments</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Fragments resorted from old drafts into questionable coherence, offered to you as a gift for making it through 2020. Well done :) </p><p> </p><p>(fluff)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>Chiasmus</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“Not again!” I groaned as I heard the riders gallop into our courtyard.</p><p>Boisterously cheerful conversation that must have scared away the avian inhabitants of the gardens heralded the arrival of the hunting party.</p><p>“Telpë!” My father was calling from the foyer. “Come here, child!”</p><p>It was hard to pretend that all fared well. </p><p>They seemed to think that I should accompany them on their hunts instead of shutting myself away in the forge. I began carefully putting away the pebbles had been examining. One stood out. It was smooth, a perfect sphere. An unnatural shape for rock hewn by water. I swallowed and turned it about on my palm. </p><p>“Telpë!” It was Irissë now. </p><p>“I come!” I said in the most cheerful tone I could muster. Hastily, I made for the door, clutching the pebble in my hand.</p><p>My father grinned when he saw me. I offered him a smile, unwilling to show him the darker seas that roiled in my head these days.</p><p>"You are not arrayed in riding clothes yet!" He said, chiding. </p><p>"I am not joining you," I replied. The disappointment in his eyes I had to look away from. </p><p>"It is only for a few days, Telpë," he began, cajoling. </p><p>"I am not fond of hunting," I said quickly. The pebble in my hand was cool against my skin. </p><p>"Then you needn't hunt! Artanis and Macalaurë are bringing books along!" </p><p>It was a large party that had assembled in the courtyard. They were impatiently waiting, chattering away in high spirits.</p><p>"Is all well?" It was Findekáno. </p><p>I had once worshipped Findekáno. He was quick to laugh and quicker to make others laugh. In my youth, he had not had that dangerous temper which had come to him after he had become an alcoholic.</p><p>"All is well," I insisted. "I merely wish for a few days of quiet." </p><p>"Come now, cousin!" Ereinion pleaded. "You have told me so many stories of these hunts. You must accompany me!"</p><p>He had hearkened to those tales so, when it had been just him and I left in Lindon, as we mourned the dead. He had fallen in Mordor for my mistake. In the periphery of my gaze, I could see Artanis's head of gold. She and I had carefully avoided each other as best as we could in this brave, new world. </p><p>"Telpë?" It was my father again, and his concern was a heavy weight to bear. I shook my head. </p><p>"I am in the middle of researches," I demurred.</p><p>“Clear out, will you?” My grandfather’s voice came exasperated, as he came outside to glare at us. “If you must be boisterous, take yourselves to the woods. Some of us have to work!”</p><p>"Fëanáro, let them be," Nolofinwë cut in, stern-voiced.</p><p>Grandfather's grumblings subsided. He came to join me, scowling at the interruption of his day's peace. Nolofinwë followed, arrayed in riding clothes, and pressed a brisk kiss of farewell to his brother's cheek. </p><p>"There was a time when you were warmer in your leave-taking," Grandfather complained. </p><p>"That was before you burned the damned ships," Nolofinwë replied tartly. </p><p>"Come, Nolofinwë, we should not delay." It was Findaráto, ever the peace-keeper. </p><p>"Will you ever stop holding the damn ships against me? You said you forgave me!" Grandfather hissed, furious. </p><p>"I had not realized that I promised eternal silence about the past," Nolofinwë said, equally angry. </p><p>They were alike in their volatile, fiery tempers; their arguments were unpleasant and loud affairs. I saw the maids and the stablehands congregating in clusters as they watched and gossiped.  </p><p>They had argued so, before Finwë's throne, and my grandfather had drawn his sword. I remembered how aghast our family had been. We had been torn then. </p><p>"My crimes I admit!" Grandfather cried. "What of yours, Nolofinwë? Your virtue is a facade! You were a married man who slept with half the army!"</p><p>"Don't speak to me of virtue, brother!" </p><p>The rage on Nolofinwë's features was a grim, old thing. His hair had once turned white in grief and fear by the Mithrim, as he tried to hold us together. All of us had changed after the Ice. Grandfather did not understand this. How could he? He had led us east and died. The rest of us had endured. </p><p>I heard the clatter of boots. Findaráto must have gone to fetch Maitimo, I knew. Sure enough, with a plain cotton robe hastily thrown over his night-clothes, he stumbled out, wiping the sleep out of his eyes.  </p><p>"You didn't have to wake him up!" Nolofinwë exclaimed, turning his ire to Findaráto.</p><p>"I would have woken, with your ruckus," Maitimo defended Findaráto. </p><p>"No, you wouldn't have," my father said, laughing. "You have slept through worse."</p><p>"I am awake now," Maitimo said equably. "Onwards with you, Nolofinwë. Bring me back choice venison!"</p><p>"For your cheek, it shall be waterfowl," Nolofinwë threatened, scowling, before sighing and ruffling my uncle's hair.  </p><p>"You could join us, cousin," Findaráto suggested. That charm of his had beguiled Elu Thingol once. </p><p>"Next time, perhaps. I promised Turkáno I would stay and keep him company."</p><p>"Turkáno will have Telpë and my brother for company," Nolofinwë pointed out.</p><p>"If they left the forge, certainly," Maitimo commented. "Off with all of you. Clear out of my courtyard!"</p><p>"Your courtyard?" My father exclaimed irritably. </p><p>"All that is upon our eden raised in vast wilderness, and all of its woods and waters," Maitimo said cheerfully, clever and witty even if he remembered nothing. </p><p>"You are my handiwork!" Artanis interrupted smugly. "Does that make you mine, cousin?"</p><p>"Artanis! Return Macalaurë intact! I shall require him for his services!"</p><p>"I promise I shall take only a bite out of his leg!" Artanis called back, laughing. It ached to hear her laughter. I was glad that they had no attention to spare me. </p><p>"You are an orc!" It was Irissë.</p><p>I had been worse, befouled and grotesque, and I could not look at Artanis anymore.</p><p>"Nolofinwë, Findaráto," Maitimo spoke then. "Please hurry. Turkáno cannot bear to watch you ride away. The longer you linger, the more he shall fret."</p><p>Nolofinwë nodded and hugged him once more. </p><p>We watched them all ride away, leaving the brown dust to settle languidly in the suddenly empty courtyard. Tears filled my eyes, as the silence settled in. Saruman's tower had been a place of grim silences. </p><p>I could see Grandfather watching me carefully. I made to return to the forge, wanting no conversation with him. </p><p>"You dropped your pebble." </p><p>Maitimo bent to pick up the pebble and offered it to me. It was from the bank of the lake where we had awoken. A perfect sphere, unlike any pebble I had seen. Maitimo's eyes were the color of the skies above us, soft of hue.</p><p>Irmo's dreams had once bled red upon Telpërion's grey leaves.</p><p>"I have no use for it," I said, choking the words out. <br/>
 <br/>
"Let me have it then," Grandfather said, holding his hand out. </p><p>"No!" I said swiftly, and plucked the stone from Maitimo's palm. </p><p>My fingers brushed his skin and I flinched. I had refused to visit him when he lay dying. I had not written to him. I had tried my best to forget him. I had tried my best to hate him for how he had pawned us all. I had hated myself, for the spite I sought. I had hated myself too, for being weak-willed and inept. I had needed his protection, in the beginning, at the end, and when he had died, my folly had nearly undone Middle Earth. Artanis could not forgive me, for she remembered what I had done. Maitimo could not begrudge me, for he remembered nothing of what I had done.</p><p>"I had best make my way to Turkáno," Maitimo said lightly, and walked back inside.</p><p>Grandfather and I stood there, in the empty courtyard, and I refused to look at the pebble in my fist. </p><p>Silver cannot outshine gold, they said. </p><p>It had been true for us. The works of my hands had not surpassed his. Once I had taken comfort that my Rings of Power had not destroyed as badly as his Silmarilli had. I had been wrong. The Silmarilli had created too, and the skies above were proof. The purity of Grandfather's work and that of his soul had turned out to be the one and the same, in the end.  </p>
<hr/><p>Supper that night was a quiet affair. Turkáno was in morose spirits, startling at every clatter of boots and slam of doors. I had heard from Irissë that Turkáno had gone entire weeks without speaking a word to another, walking his valley of lilies in the high mountains. </p><p>Grandfather was quiet, as was his custom. Maitimo too had fallen silent after making vacuous remarks about the wine. In his oblivion, he did not have his sophisticated diplomacy that had easily courted along allies and strangers at the table.   </p><p>"Chiasmus," Turkáno said finally. "I was struggling with rhetorical parallelism today." </p><p>"Who fears yet braves? Stands tall, yet trembles?" Grandfather offered kindly. </p><p>Turkáno scowled at the reference to his paranoia. Sighing, he continued, "I suppose that is not unwarranted. Uncle, must you pick at scabs?"</p><p>He shook his head before Grandfather could apologize. I could not fathom how they could easily forgive each other, in this brave, new world. </p><p>"What was your chiasmus?" Maitimo asked. </p><p>"In pride, pity; vice, in virtue." </p><p>Turkáno was the most erudite of us. It did not surprise me that Artanis and he had undertaken writing. Her self-discipline and his erudition must make a powerful alliance in their endeavor. </p><p>"Is pity a vice? Is pride virtuous?" Maitimo wondered. </p><p>"Well, I require them only to be similar," Turkáno replied. </p><p>"Perhaps an inversion?" Maitimo suggested. "Virtuous, by vice; by pride, piteous."</p><p>Turkáno hummed, mulling it over, before saying, "I was aiming to strike a tone of lightness. Findaráto says that nobody wishes to read tragedies anymore, unless they are written as farce."</p><p>"I suggest writing of geese then," Grandfather said wryly. </p><p>"Ah! An extended metaphor! The geese that migrated and were eaten for dinner by wild men!" Turkáno parried. </p><p>"Artanis shall be horrified," Maitimo said, laughing, his eyes reflecting the glint of the torches and the goblet of wine he held. </p><p>"Nothing horrifies Artanis," Turkáno said brightly, and the affection in his voice pained me. I had seen her horrified. I had seen her frightened and in despair. I had been the cause. </p><p>"What is a chiasmus?" I asked, striving to change the subject.  </p><p>"A crossing," Grandfather explained. "As a crossbar, where two pieces of wood or metal intersect each other forming four perpendiculars. In gemology, it is an asterism, of impurities uniformly crossing a gem."</p><p>"In rhetoric, it means that the words closest to each other are perpendicular or opposite, while the bracketing words are similar," Turkáno added. </p><p>"It is one of the more frequent shapes in anatomy," Maitimo chimed in. "If you dress game, you would see that the crossing of tendons frequently take on this shape."   </p><p>Saruman had gone on at length about anatomy, when he had been creating his master race of orcs. </p>
<hr/><p>Grandfather hurried back to the forge after supper. With Nolofinwë's absence, I suspected that he would spend the next few days immersed in work. I would have liked to follow him and lose myself in craft, but I feared that he might corner me for a conversation.</p><p>I followed Maitimo and Turkáno into the library. They were still carrying on about rhetorical devices. I found their chatter pleasant and irrelevant, and suspected that it would lull me to sleepiness soon enough.   </p><p>"I mean to knit awhile", Turkáno said, sitting beside the hearth in his usual armchair. "It helps my writing." </p><p>"The muse that lurks in the cross-stitch. Oh, another chiasmus!" Maitimo exclaimed, gracefully flopping down on the rug and leaning back against Turkáno's legs. "May I knit the other end?"</p><p>"I shall feed your fingers to Tyelko's hounds if you ruin my masterpiece!"</p><p>"Artanis has trained Tyelko's hounds to eat vegetables. I doubt my fingers shall compare."</p><p>The masterpiece under construction was a misshapen, lumpy wool rhombus of many colors. Turkáno flung an end over Maitimo's shoulder and handed over a pair of knitting needles.   </p><p>My mother had knitted, I remembered. So had Túrin. For one ruthless and fierce as he had been, he had known many arts that were the provenance of women. He knew to darn, to knit, to cook, and when pressed, he had said that he had been close to his mother once.</p><p>"Who taught you to knit? You have dramatically improved," Turkáno asked. </p><p>"Macalaurë!"</p><p>"He taught me too," Turkáno laughed. "He excels at all that is the provenance of women." </p><p>"Oh, don't you let him hear that!" Maitimo exclaimed. </p><p>"I am not the one imperiled by proximity, Russandol."</p><p>"He is a delightful helpmeet. I highly recommend him."</p><p>Turkáno roared in laughter and bent to press a kiss to Maitimo's tangled crown of hair. </p><p>Their ease in each other's company took me to the days of my childhood, when I had watched my father and his brothers and cousins live in a world of their own, complete. I had not been lonely then. Grandfather had held a place for me in his forge. In his own way, Grandfather had cherished and doted upon me. These days, due to the standstill between us, Grandfather reserved his fondness for Ereinion. I did not mind. Ereinion craved family more than I did.  </p><p>"Shall we retire?" Turkáno asked, setting aside his needles. </p><p>"Mine or yours?" </p><p>"I am not letting you into my bed, cousin."</p><p>"Your chaise, then," Maitimo said brightly, rising to his feet and offering his hand to his cousin. </p><p>Their tactility I could not understand. Ereinion and I were close, as cousins could be, but we had not among ourselves this excess of tactility. Maitimo had been once loathe to allow another to touch him, and had usually expressed his affection in words or with brief brushes of his fingers upon another's wrist that he initiated. And yet, even then, he had allowed embraces from his cousins and brothers. </p><p>Now, he hearkened to touch as innocently as a sunflower to the sun. Even standoffish, awkward Turkáno indulged him unfalteringly. And Macalaurë, who would have once bitten off the head of anyone that dared touch his brother, said nothing anymore.   </p><p>"Take me to your bed. Macalaurë must have a reason to leave his quarters abandoned."</p><p>"He said that you have begun to use his chambers to store your overflowing cases of books."</p><p>"I am merely being efficient! He has not been by in years!"</p><p>"What can I say? I am an exacting employer and keep him quite occupied."</p><p>Laughing and in high spirits, they corralled each other to bed. I saw easily through Maitimo's act. He was keen to prevent Turkáno from sliding into paranoia, fretting of our family and the perils that might befall them. Turkáno must know too, and he played along. Perhaps once, he might have found it condescension. Once, he might have railed at Maitimo's tendency to manipulate outcomes.  </p><p>In these latter days, knowing that Maitimo had wrought an ending that was freedom's beginning, our family had stopped questioning his ways. </p>
<hr/><p>Sauron, the Abhorred, they had called him. Mairon, he had been to me, even when he had taken me captive. He had not maltreated me. He had stood aside when Saruman had come to claim me on Itarillë's behalf. He would not cross her when Laurefindë's safety was at stake.<br/>
 <br/>
Silver cannot outshine gold. </p><p>I remembered my final meeting with Maitimo, in Círdan's halls, when he had still been in possession of lucidity. It had been a bitter parting. I had resented him for how he charted our lives. He had found me ungrateful. </p><p>He had sent me away with what I had considered ravings.</p><p><em>“I deprived a man of choice when I sold him to Melkor. You deprived me of choice when you saved my life in Formenos. Would that the man I sold does not deprive you of choice at the end!”</em>  </p><p>When Mairon took me captive in Eregion, I knew that it had been my uncle's accursed foresight in those parting words. Mairon had been manipulated to enter Melkor's service when Maitimo had bargained with Irmo for Artanis's safety. Mairon had held my uncle to life and sanity in Angband. </p><p>I had begged Mairon to kill me, for the sake of our friendship of once. <em>Your family shan't be my bane anymore</em>, he had said. I had not been his bane. I had merely befriended him and considered him an equal, as I sought to get away from Grandfather's shadow, from the cabal of unspoken allegiances and bone deep faith that had run in my father and his brethren. </p><p>In torment, reduced to a beast, I had cried out to Mairon. Then, in vain, I had cried out to the dead, to Grandfather, to Maitimo, to Findekáno. And I had finally called out to the Valar. Only Irmo answered. In dreams, he sung to me of how red fell the dew upon silver leaves. </p><p>My mercy had come from Thranduil in the end, when he bore a sword of my make, and inlaid in its pommel had been one of Grandfather's emeralds prospected from Formenos's mines. </p><p>Elerrína's grandson, bereaved and alone, had gifted me an ending as once she had gifted another a beginning. Our fates had been intertwined. Eol had been Thingol's scorned lover who had stolen Irissë. Thingol had been Findaráto's beloved, left to fall to grief and insanity after my uncle's death. Thingol had protected Túrin, who had been Nargothrond's doom and my savior once. </p><p>Oropher had led his people to slaughter for Ereinion's war.  </p><p>Celeborn had kept Artanis safe after the fall of Ereinion. He had given her power and fealty, even if he had not given her fidelity. </p><p>Oropher's grandson had been in the Fellowship of the Ring, to unmake the evil I had wrought.<br/>
 <br/>
And there was Elerrína's grandchild, Thranduil, who had become the fabric knitting together those who remained after the Last Alliance. He had held together Elrond, Erestor, Glorfindel, Gildor, Círdan, Celeborn, and Artanis, as once Nolofinwë had held our family together. Together, they had prevailed against Mordor. Together, they had sailed at the end. Together, they had won their last battle on Valinor's plains.</p><p>In the crossings of our family, there had ever been Elerrína's blood, as  chiasmus. </p><p>Perhaps Artanis had done the right thing, in the end, in stripping Maitimo of memories, for how could he have lived with the guilt of saving his at the cost of another's? </p>
<hr/><p>I came to the forge to find Grandfather teaching an apprentice to facet a gem.  I remembered him teaching me once, and how stern he had been in his instruction. His expectations had been unrealistic, for he had wanted of me the same calibre as his. <br/>
 <br/>
He had mellowed out. He tolerated imperfection in his apprentices without losing his patience. </p><p>I went to my station and sat down to inspect the perfect sphere. I had found it when sieving by the lake. It was colorless in the harsh lights of the forge.  I drew the damasks and lit tallow candles. There were veins of faintest blue crossing its surface, leaving it asteriated, as the beryls Narvi's people had mined in Moria. Unusually symmetrical in its refraction.  I had never seen its like before. I could cut it as a cabochon, but I mused if there was another way to preserve its symmetry. </p><p>"May I join you?" </p><p>Grandfather had sent away his apprentices and it was just the two of us left. He came to me, but had the courtesy to stay at a respectful distance from my station, as he waited for my response. </p><p>I wanted his opinion. I wanted to show him that I did not need his guidance any more. His patience in letting me come to my decision swayed me in the end. </p><p>"Have you seen its like before?" I asked him. </p><p>"In the foothills of the Pelori," he said absently. "As you can see, forces of wind or water or friction cannot shape this. This was created so when Eru's light spliced the primordial." He scrutinized it further, in silence, before remarking, "A perfect asteriation too. If we were to cut it as a cabochon-No! It would not do! We need to preserve the filigree."</p><p>The enthusiasm in his voice was barely contained. </p><p>"I have not decided yet," I said firmly. It was my find and I wanted no partnership with him. </p><p>"Very well," he said, accepting. </p><p>"What do you make of the veins?" I asked, curious. "Did the ones you had seen by the Pelori have a similar composition?" </p><p>"Let me show you." He beckoned me closer and dug out his magnifying glass from his tool belt. I leaned over his shoulder and peered through the glass. </p><p>"Fascinating," I muttered. "Perfect perpendiculars, as meridians."</p><p>No beryl or cat's eye or sapphire in the mines of Arda or Middle Earth or Valinor had yielded such an asteriation. </p><p>"Symmetry requires one cutting another to form perfect halves," Grandfather told me. He drew a parchment to him and began inking out numbers and calculations swiftly, illustrating his meaning, modeling the phenomenon that must have occurred. </p><p>"Creation is a solitary pursuit to most," he continued. "Eru created alone. The Valar created alone, for each were given their own dominion. In turn, they taught us the same lesson, when we wrought of metal or flute or quill. Autonomy in creation is essential, for dissonance is grit."</p><p>"And yet this was the work of two," I said softly, looking over his equations. </p><p>"Yes, an asteriation of one's whims upon another's will," he said, rueful. </p><p>Artanis had strong tastes and distastes. Her desires had speckled creation, modulated symmetrically across its levelness. Her fears and grudges and bitternesses were legendary, and could have easily crafted dystopia; yet they had not been allowed sway, under the precise alchemy will-wrought by Maitimo.  </p><p>Creation, I had thought, must be driven by desire and passion. Maitimo had demonstrated that it can be an act of dispassion and will.  </p><p>"They were the last I expected to act in synchrony," I admitted. Artanis had resented him for Macalaurë, for Findekáno, for the war she had inherited. "Antithetical as oil and water, as they had been, as they are."</p><p>"As chiasmus, there is completion to be found in the diametrically similar bracketing the dissimilar. It is the silence that gives meaning to a song. It is the space that gives meaning to a word."</p>
<hr/><p><br/>
    <br/>
Evening found me with Maitimo alone at supper. Turkáno was immersed in writing and Grandfather in the forge. </p><p>"You are quiet," he remarked, as he poured himself wine. </p><p>I had nothing to say. I could not behold him without remembering what he had forgotten. </p>
<hr/><p>Húrin visited us the next day. He came on a wagon, bearing pumpkins and misshapen gourds.</p><p>"The spokes are poorly set," I remarked, worried. Perhaps I should have one of my apprentices take a look at them. </p><p>"I can see to it later today," Grandfather said lightly, walking to greet Húrin. </p><p>Since when had he deigned to repair the mundane? He had flung away a glass I had once wrought because of an imperfection that had bubbled to its neck when forging. </p><p>He must genuinely be fond of Húrin. </p><p>"I told Turgon that he ought to leave it to another," Húrin said cheerfully, as he began unloading his pumpkins onto a wheel barrow. When two of the maids came to help, he waved them away, and they ran giggling. </p><p>"Turkáno?" I questioned, disbelieving.</p><p>"He said he had learned from the mighty Feanor himself." </p><p>"I had attempted to teach him. He lasted barely an hour before running away whinging to my brother," Grandfather said wryly. "If you must trust any of them at all with wheel and spoke, let it be Atarinkë."</p><p>"It was not that difficult!" Turkáno insisted, when the tale was brought up at dinner. "I read a book!"</p><p>"Ah, that explains it," Húrin said solemnly, eyes twinkling in good humor. </p><p>Golden-haired, bright-smiled, he reminded me so of Laurefindë, of Mairon's Laurefindë. In his mannerisms, however, I saw Indis. So must many in our family, including Grandfather, I suspected. </p><p>The kitchens had served pumpkins and gourds and poultry. Turkáno's favorites. Maitimo was picking at the poultry woebegone, but at least the pickled vegetables were to his exacting taste. </p><p>"You added the verjus this time!" He exclaimed. </p><p>"Well, now that the wines bear fruit, I might as well as put them to use," Húrin observed. </p><p>Use everything to its utmost, Túrin would have said. Túrin had come to me with a black blade, as Mormegil, having killed kin and ally. He had been cruel in how he had shaped Nargothrond's court to serve his ambition. There had been no act below his dignity or honor. Túrin had once told me that sons as he were born of fathers as his, of fathers who had flung aside their family's protection to save another's. In the end, he had flung himself on the sword I had crafted on him.  </p><p>I had not loved another as I had come to love Túrin.</p><p>Húrin was here, the only one among the Edain, for he had mattered to the architect of this brave, new world.  </p><p>Túrin's soul, as Finwë's, as Elerrína's, had all been flung to nonexistence when the halls of Mandos had been destroyed. <em>All lives are equal,</em> I had held once, in Nargothrond, and Túrin had laughed at my naivety.<br/>
 </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>I was sieving in a rocky outcrop when I heard voices in passionate discussion.</p><p>"You cannot hope to stay his fears this way, by being his crutch," Húrin was saying. </p><p>"What do you suggest then? Send him into his fits of anxiety and hope that he unlearns his fears?"</p><p>"Maedhros, I share your worry. He is my friend. However, friendship is what compels me to recommend this."</p><p>"You cannot know-" Maitimo bit his words off hastily. </p><p><em>It is poor form to open scabs that you have no balm to heal</em>, he had always held. </p><p>"Let him stay at my home for a few weeks. It will wean him from his fear of parting."</p><p>"Why must he be weaned? Why must we be brave now? Our wars are done. This is our peace." </p><p>Húrin sighed, before he began to speak again. "Once, you dreamed of strong cities and a bountiful land for your people, that they might possess houses full of all goods. There shall be wells, vineyards, and oliveyards, and fruit trees in abundance. Of them then, it would be said: they ate, and were filled, and became fat, and abounded with delight at their great fortune." </p><p>"And we have that now," Maitimo said softly. "We have that, Húrin." </p><p>He had that. The rest of us remembered yet what we mourned. </p><p>"What is after this?" Húrin pressed. "What comes after this? We need not be paranoid. Preparedness is not paranoia. Beasts as Ungoliant lurk in the primordial chaos. If one could enter Eru's creation, another could enter yours. It is not cruelty to wean Turgon away from his crutches. He may one day thank us for it."</p><p>"Have you no faith in me?" </p><p>"I ride without armor and sword because I have faith in you," Húrin retorted. "This is not about what we must hold faith in, Maedhros. On the contrary, this is about the wisdom to make faith unnecessary." </p><p>His pragmatism and perseverance reminded me deeply of Túrin. He had not Túrin's hubris, however. </p><p>"My father would enjoy your rabble-rousing, stormcrow," Maitimo said dryly. "He cannot accept this for what it is."</p><p>Húrin said nothing, and the silence hung heavy between them. Maitimo finally said, "Very well. I shall speak to Turkáno. I have no desire to see him crippled by his fears if one day his well-being depends on overcoming them. Does that suffice, my wise one?"</p><p>"There is no need to sound so begrudging," Húrin laughed. "I learned wisdom from you." </p><p>"I am glad that you came," Maitimo replied softly. "I had missed you so."</p><p>"You ride to the foot of my hill without entering my home," Húrin noted. </p><p>"I feared I might be unwelcome." The hesitance and uncertainty in my uncle's tone I had rarely discerned before. He was not one to look for another's approval.  </p><p>"Oh, but you are as footrot, contagious and incurable."</p><p>"I shan't tire of my lovers comparing me to a cattle disease," Maitimo replied pertly. </p><p>I glanced up from my sieving, and sure enough, was amused by how his eyes were ablaze in good humor and there was a flush to his cheeks. He was utterly incapable of resigning curiosity and imagination. And he drew the predictable, invariant response in Húrin's exasperated fondness and tender flirtation. I rolled my eyes when Húrin came to brush away tangles of hair from his companion's face.</p><p>"Maglor visits me frequently," Húrin said then. </p><p>"He told me."</p><p>"He said that you refuse to accompany him to my home."</p><p>"I didn't-" Maitimo exhaled and waved his hands expressively. "I have no desire to cause you discomfort."</p><p>"He came to me first to thank me."</p><p>"I know he must have spoken to you of other matters," Maitimo muttered, unusually embarrassed, fidgeting. "I could tell." </p><p>This was my uncle who had had no reserve in screaming under Findekáno's whip in the middle of our camp. </p><p>"Only for your sake," Húrin said peaceably. "Come now, you must prefer his newfound ways to his poetry."</p><p>"There is poetry too," Maitimo said, wry and long-suffering and altogether content. "I owe you my gratitude."</p><p>"You can repay me by speaking to your nephew."</p><p>"Ereinion?" </p><p>"Celebrimbor," Húrin said quietly. </p><p>I stilled in my work, surprised. </p><p>"We are not close. He does not seek my counsel, Húrin."</p><p>We had once been close. I had sought his counsel. I had gladly sought Artanis for her counsel. </p><p>"He is spiraling. It is evident to me. Surely you must have seen it too."</p><p>I was not spiraling. I was coping.  </p><p>"I shall ask Artanis to speak to him."</p><p>"He flinches away from Artanis."</p><p>"He flinches away from me!" Maitimo said furiously. "I remember nothing. If I force myself to, I can remember impressions of memories when I dwell on the emotions displayed by a person. I am oblivious, not ignorant. I can read his reactions easily enough."  </p><p>"Why would I want to unearth the truths behind his fear of me? Why would I want to know the reason I am unforgiven? For all I know, I may have sent him to slaughter too, as I had sent everyone else." </p><p>He waved his hands at the world, at the skies and the lands, as if in explanation. </p><p>"I did what I could. The griefs of others are not mine to bear, not anymore. This is not perfection, but this is something, and I refuse to seek forgiveness for it."</p><p>I had heard him speak so openly only once before, when we had faced each other at the end, when I had taken my leave.  <em>Thus falls to me what my betters spurn</em>, he had said, weary, wretched, willing himself to live. I had not heeded his lamentation, as I hastened to leave him behind to his wars. </p><p>"You are not one to be cruel, Maedhros," Húrin was saying. </p><p>I blinked the tears out of my gaze. Oh, Maitimo could be cruel. Mairon had been proof of that. Findekáno had been proof of that. </p><p>"I saw the wretched prince whose skin I live in, whose memories were burned out of my soul. I shan't wield cruelty upon him again," Maitimo said quietly.    </p><p>"Dissociation again, princeling?" Húrin asked, laughing, unruffled by the strange words Maitimo spoke. He leaned in to press a kiss to my uncle's cheek. Those who loved Maitimo loved his strangenesses too. </p><p>"What a bold thing you are," Maitimo remarked, diverted, light of heart. </p><p>"Carry on so, coy and beguiling, and Maglor and I shall have to negotiate the care and keeping of you." </p><p>"I am not a possession to be bandied about!"</p><p>"Oh, but you are eminently possessable!"</p><p>"I have dearly missed you," Maitimo said then, solemn and earnest.</p><p>"Aure entuluva," Húrin replied kindly, as he stood proud, bound and hallowed by his promise. </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p><br/>
"Telpë?" </p><p>It was Turkáno. I cursed silently. Húrin must have spoken to him. </p><p>"I am fine," I insisted, before he could start a well-meaning and clumsy speech. </p><p>"Does beholding Húrin remind you of his son? I can dine with him in my receiving chambers." </p><p>Turkáno was kind, had always been, despite his awkwardness and introversion. He had saved me on the Ice, and he had been too late then to save his wife. Itarillë had not forgiven either of us her mother's death. </p><p>When Turkáno had begun his liaison with my father, he had sought my approval. He had tried to reassure me that it would change nothing. </p><p>"There is no likeness. Túrin resembled his mother's people," I said honestly. Túrin had had a warrior's stature; he had been tall and handsome. Húrin, while pleasant to look upon, did not have his son's form or face.  </p><p>"Artanis misses your company," Turkáno said then. "You avoid her."</p><p>I sighed. This was why I had not wanted him to speak of his concerns. He lacked tact in his awkwardness and settled for plainness instead. </p><p>"Your father and I have been concerned," he said then.</p><p>I looked at him in disbelief and swallowed down the sniping words I wanted to speak to him. Ereinion would be better served by their solicitousness. I had no use for it. </p><p>"Fëanáro has been concerned too," he continued, imploring. </p><p>Grandfather's care was my mother's death in Alqualondë, my father's death in Doriath, and how I had begged Mairon for death in vain. He may have mellowed, but I remembered where his care had taken me to. </p><p>"I shall speak to you if I am doing poorly," I promised Turkáno. </p><p>None of this was his fault, after all. </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>"Speak to her, won't you?" </p><p>It was Ereinion, fretting about. Grandfather had gone prospecting when the hunters had returned. I suspected that Nolofinwë's exuberant spirits had worn him down. </p><p>Ereinion, after regaling me for days on end about their hunt, excited and so giddy in happiness, as he finally <em>belonged</em>, had come to roost on a weightier topic that did not concern him at all. I glared at him. I did not interfere in his affairs. Could he not exercise the same courtesy? </p><p>I could not blame him for his nosiness. He liked to be of use. From the earliest days of our acquaintance, he had cast himself as worthy only if another could find him useful. </p><p>"Come now, cousin!" He insisted. "You used to orbit each other once, completing sentences and speaking in glances! Surely, you must miss her too!"</p><p>"Did she say that she missed me?" I asked, despite my vow to let it be. </p><p>"It is Galadriel!" Ereinion exclaimed, laughing. "When has she spoken of needing another? She said instead that I make a passable nephew, as nephews go, for at least I have not abandoned her."</p><p>Macalaurë had accused me of abandoning Maitimo, at the end. </p><p>Aggrieved that I had not made amends with my uncle, I had tried to salvage what remained. <em>Together</em>, I had promised Artanis, after Maitimo's death, after Morgoth's fall. <em>He said I shall be alone until the end</em>, she had said fiercely, weeping in my arms.  I had urged her to leave behind Maitimo's cause, to find safety and home in her husband and child. She had shaken her head and braved fate. </p><p>He had not passed down his legacy via primogeniture. His cause had not come to Ereinion or to me, to Elrond or Elros. Instead, he had chosen Artanis as the herald of dusk. </p><p>"You are moping," Ereinion continued. </p><p>"Merely thinking, Gil."</p><p>He scowled at that name. </p><p>"You threw a vase at me once when I called you Ereinion," I reprimanded him. </p><p>"That was then. I have changed," he said effortlessly. </p><p>He had. Family suited him in ways it had not suited me. </p><p>I had changed too, and I knew that it was not for the better. </p><p>"Have you cut that pebble yet?" Ereinion asked, roosting on another subject. "If you have not yet, may I watch you? Grandfather said it will be instructional." </p><p>When had he begun calling Fëanáro Grandfather? I blinked at him in surprise.</p><p>"He suggested it," Ereinion said brightly. As hungry for familial associations as he was, Ereinion could not refuse the suggestion. "Maglor found it puzzling, but Lord Maedhros said it had been awhile in the making."</p><p>"Lording him still?" I asked, laughing at his contradictions. "He named you and crowned you. Not even the stablehands call him by title anymore."</p><p>"I must call him something," Ereinion said, shrugging, looking away, twisting his hands in an old nervous tic that he had not grown out of. </p><p>I remembered the lanky, sharp-eyed boy he had been, with a grudge against the world. He had reminded me of Túrin. The crown had not made him a King. No, it was later, when he sought to undo my mistake by marching to Mordor that the harpers had sung of him. In my prison, I had heard their lamentations and mourned him.</p><p>"He shan't mind, you know," I said, thinking of how hungry and keening he had been once for the least of praise and acknowledgement, thinking of how desperate he had been in his determination to matter. </p><p>"I know," Ereinion said simply. Then he shook his head and continued, "I did not come to speak of that. I came to insist that you ought to make amends with Galadriel. She deserves better than your cold-shouldering. There is nothing more she could have done, for anyone."</p><p>Then, because he knew me quite well, he cursed, and came to my side, saying, "You feel guilty. Why?"</p><p>The War of the Ring. The Last Alliance. Eregion. How many had died for my folly from Gondor to the Shire? </p><p>Ereinion had pleaded with me to abandon Eregion. The siege had been in the weeks after his wedding. He had despatched Erestor from their wedding bed when I had refused to leave my city. His bonded-mate had come with their army, with Elrond and with Laurefindë. Elrond, wise, had led our people west, emptying out the settlements before the Nine took the city. The Nine had feared Laurefindë; they must have feared Mairon's wrath should harm befall him. </p><p>Erestor had knelt before me and begged, asking me to accompany him to safety. I had refused. He had been the last to leave the city, and he had set it on fire, burning the granaries and the stables to hinder pursuit and to buy time for Elrond and the refugees fleeing. Scorched earth. Artanis and Maitimo would have approved. </p><p>"You asked me to abandon the city," I said quietly, crossing my hands and digging my palms into my wrists. </p><p>"I asked you to abandon the city because I did not want you to die there." </p><p>"I did not die in Eregion," I said calmly, staring at his knuckles that turned white when he fisted his hands. </p><p>"Celebrimbor-" Ereinion began, horrified. </p><p>"I loathe that name. Silver cannot outshine gold and yet foolish parents named their children after a less precious metal, condemning them as of poorer worth."</p><p>Celeborn. Celebrían. Idril Celebrindal. Names of silver had not done us favors. </p><p>"You were the first in our family given a birth-name in Sindarin, did you know? Even Irissë had named her son in Quenya before Eol could name him in Sindarin." I looked at Ereinion, who was listening to me keenly. </p><p>"Maitimo clung to your name for centuries in fever and nightmares and delirium, ever since he returned. When Artanis wrote to me of you, of how he had named you and claimed you to place you in the line of succession, I knew what it must mean. He believed he had ruined Findekáno's chances for a marriage. He believed in a woman's right to keep her child. You were his apology to Findekáno. You were his apology to Elerrína."</p><p>In Angband, something had happened to turn Mairon's conscience. He had taken great risks to keep Maitimo alive. <em>The most wretched of all Gods' creation</em>, Mairon had said. </p><p>"I did not think Lord Maedhros was attracted to women," Ereinion said then, fixating on that irrelevant detail, avoiding the emotional import of the truth I had given him. </p><p>Grandfather entered the forge then, carrying a rucksack with the spoils of his prospecting. Ereinion shouted a greeting and rushed across to help him, neatly avoiding our conversation. </p><p>I shook my head, amused by how little my cousin had changed.</p><p>He would have run his kingdom to the ground if not for Artanis. He would have run his marriage to the ground if not for Erestor. It was not his fault, I knew. He had been raised at an arm's distance by Círdan. He had taken in the foundlings left behind in The War of the Powers: he had taken in Artanis and I, Elrond and Erestor and Glorfindel. He was a man of action and retreated from emotional situations whenever he could. He had not Findekáno's earnestness in what pertained to the heart. Scrappy survivor-orphan that he had been raised as, he protected himself fiercely. He protected himself fiercely only to give up all for the sake of another he loved, whenever the choice came to that: how many legislations had he written off in favor of Lothlorien or Greenwood to keep the peace between Artanis and Celeborn? He had let Lindon's tax revenue be redirected to Imladris when Elrond and Erestor refused to return. He had ridden to Mordor to end the war I began. </p><p>He had changed the sun on our heraldry from gold to silver when Maitimo had died. <em>Let this be the first of my commandments</em>, he had declared. </p><p><em>Nothing good can come of this, </em>Celeborn had cautioned.</p><p><em>It is the truth of our caus</em>e, Ereinion had said resolutely.</p><p>Artanis had then, for the first time, seen him for the King he was. Unravelling as she had been, I had not the heart to tell her that I had told her so, that I had been right about Ereinion all along. </p><p><em>All our lives together, and you were right once</em>, she had protested, knowing well my amusement at the fall of her hubris.</p><p><em>Perhaps you are losing your touch, Artanis. Perhaps I shall be right about everything from here onwards!</em> I had held. I had believed it too. Maitimo was dead. The ages of his statecraft and war were behind us. Let him live on our flags. Let us live for ourselves. So I had thought, as I had ridden to establish Eregion.  </p><p>"Telpë!" </p><p>It was Grandfather. I went across to him. He offered me a pouch of cotton. There were little dots stained by malachite, testifying to how frequently he had confirmed the acidity of the fabric during transport. His attention to the minutest of details had always been remarkable.  </p><p>The least refined work of his hands had been the sword he had crafted for Nolofinwë, the only work of his on Arda. The garnet of it, a plain almandine, had come from a mine that had not yielded another garnet in its history. A simple sword of folded steel, embellished with a commonplace gem, and it had accompanied us to dusk. Nolofinwë had made a God bleed ichor. Maitimo had clung to it, as he clung to life, until he gave both to Macalaurë. Macalaurë had raised the sword for the last time under the statue of the broideress, in a holy place where dreams fell.  </p><p>The least of Grandfather's works, and even it had outlasted time. </p><p>I opened the pouch, and exclaimed in surprise. Perfectly symmetrical opals with silver asterisms, oblong before they had even been cut.  </p><p>"You must have sieved for days," I said softly, when Grandfather came to stand beside me. </p><p>"What else did you bring?" I asked, wishing that my voice would stay steady.</p><p>Grandfather's gaze was open, as Findekáno's, and the earnestness of it made me look away. He had gone prospecting for days to bring me this. </p><p>I cleared my throat and fetched my pebble, my perfectly spherical stone of grey speckled by blue. I arranged the opals about it, in a half-close. <em>Closure is overrated</em>, she would often say, laughing, whenever she forgave her husband and took him back after an infidelity or two.  </p><p>"It shall become Artanis," Grandfather remarked, as if he had not toiled for days with this end in mind. </p><p>I dragged a parchment close and began inking out designs, calculating placement and angle and depth. I wanted to keep the symmetry, even if it would be an open circle.  </p><p>Grandfather did not say anything, but I could sense his frustration as I attempted calculations many times over. </p><p>"Well?" I asked him, equally frustrated.</p><p>"Only an idea," he murmured, taking the quill from me and quickly scribbling equations of chemistry and composition, deriving from these then the design, before returning again to refine the equations, in iterations back and forth. <em>From the pieces, the whole, and from the whole, the pieces</em> , he had taught me once, in his forge at Tirion, when I had been a child.  </p><p>I saw the careful design emerge from his work, ambitious and extraordinarily detailed in its making, though simple and sans ornery to the eye as all work of his hands were. </p><p>I could have toiled for years and not emerged with a design as starkly beautiful as this, an asterism blooming at the chiasmus of the drawing. Ereinion was watching me. I shook my head, staving off the concern on his features.  <br/>
 <br/>
Grandfather must have sensed my tension, because he cleared his throat and set aside the quill hastily, as if it burned his fingers. "I apologize. I had not meant to be carried away." He raked his hands over his face, tired. "I apologize, Telpë." He made to fold up the design, no doubt to discard it. </p><p>"No," I said hesitantly. </p><p>I was glad for Ereinion's presence. It stayed me from my impulsive resentments. With a sprinkling of calm, I could see that Grandfather could not help it, that he did not mean to display his merit. When had he wrought anything for himself? He had made grand gifts for our family, again and again, and remained as he was, unadorned and plain. In Tirion and in Formenos, he had dressed simply unlike his father and brothers, content in his seclusion in the forge. He would have made a poor ruler, as he had made a poor husband and father and brother. </p><p>"It is an excellent design." </p><p>Truly, it was. I had never seen the like of it before. Work <em>with</em> the matter, he had often extolled me. </p><p>I took a deep breath and moved the gem I had found by the lake to him. </p><p>"I did not mean to anger you, Telpë," Grandfather began, helpless and glum. </p><p>"I am not angry," I said, unnerved by how affected he seemed by my disapproval. "It is beyond my skill. It is well within yours. Make this for Artanis."</p><p>"Forgive me," he began again, shaken. There were tears glistening in his eyes. I cursed myself and him both, for we knew that he was not asking for forgiveness for this. There was nothing to be done, I thought, as I reached to pat his shoulder tentatively. </p><p>"I am not angry," I reiterated. </p><p>He nodded abruptly, muttered a few hasty and incoherent words of leave-taking, and rushed away from us, slamming the doors behind him. </p><p>Ereinion stood beside me, uncomfortable and yet resolute. Then, surprising me, he clumsily pulled me into an embrace. </p><p>"You are slipping," I accused him half-heartedly, resting my head on his broad shoulder. "More of this, and you shall be as bad as Nolofinwë."</p><p>"I have a while to go before I turn a serial embracer of family," he said mildly.</p><p>Then, because he was determined to unravel my composure in entirety, he continued, "I forgive you, cousin."</p><p>I was glad that he could not see my wretched relief. </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>I knocked twice.  </p><p>Artanis's lips were parted in surprise when she opened her doors and beheld me. Robin's blue, they had called her eyes. I thought of the asteriated opals Grandfather was toiling over.   </p><p>"Come in," she said quietly, brave, ever so brave, despite her trembling form that betrayed her. </p><p>I shook my head and knelt before her.</p><p>"Telpë-" her voice hitched as she clutched desperately at the door for support. </p><p>"I am sorry, for all of it," I told her earnestly. </p><p>"Eregion was not your fault," she replied, refusing to look away, her eyes wary in the manner of the hunted. </p><p>"What followed was."</p><p>"You should have killed yourself," she agreed. "You should have known better than to survive the fall of the city."</p><p>Artanis had never advocated half-measures. Those had been my cowardly province. She had been absolute in her convictions. </p><p>When the city had fallen, when I had refused to abandon it, Erestor had glanced to where my sword hung loose in my hand, his gaze full of meaning. I had shaken my head. As they had surrounded me and trapped me, there had been slivers of opportunity, and Mairon had been unsurprised when I was taken alive to him.  <em>Oh, Telpë, my predictable friend</em>, he had said ruefully.  </p><p>Unlike Nolofinwë and Grandfather, unlike my father and uncles, I had hesitated when I knew I had lost the city. Ereinion was not Findekáno. There would be no valiant with a harp come to save me, I had known.</p><p>Suicide was anathema to our kind, a crime in the laws given unto us by the Valar. In our family, only Maitimo and Míriel had taken their own lives. The rest of us had fallen with a sword in our hand, defending what we loved. </p><p>"You did not want his end," Artanis said quietly, seeing through to the heart of my folly. "You did not want anything of his for your legacy."</p><p>I had considered him rabidly insane at the end, and had feared that he would continue to spell the death of us, that his legacy would be a doom worse than that of Mandos. The Valar had begun to forgive us, after Earendil's pleas, after Arafinwë's continued campaigning on our behalf, after Varda's intercession. Maitimo had refused to lay down his cause. Artanis, Ereinion, and Elros, had refused to break from him. I had not forgiven him then, for discarding the mercy we had bled and died for. </p><p>I had not forgiven him, for walking to his death, leaving Artanis with his war, leaving Macalaurë to abandonment, leaving Ereinion to hold together the little that remained. </p><p>"There is no death kinder than the one you choose the manner of," Artanis declared. </p><p>She had chosen her death, in Formenos, as she heralded dusk with rising tide and breaking earth, surrounded by the power of the Silmarilli, made victorious by her faith in a conjurer and his secrets. </p><p>I remembered her in Gladden Fields, mere flesh on bone, despoiled and ruined, her golden head streaked with mud and blood, torn apart by the teeth of wolves and the claws of Saruman's beasts, hung upon a willow's knotted branch by a butcher's hook. I remembered her horror when she discerned what manner of monstrosity I had been turned to by the Enemy's hands. I remembered her screams until she fell voiceless. </p><p>She had refused to die, stringing herself to life on a dead man's promise.  <br/>
 <br/>
Thranduil had cut her off the willow and hastened to check her pulse. </p><p><em>Not yet</em>, she had said, with blood burbling at her lips, eyes faraway, as she sought to behold the end. <em>I swore an oath. An oath to live.</em></p><p>So she had lived.</p><p>"Artanis," I began. "I cannot say I would have done anything differently. I considered suicide cowardice." </p><p>"Is suicide cowardice because it is considered cowardly by the Valar? Do the Valar consider it cowardly because it truly is cowardice?" Artanis asked, posing the dilemma I had languished over for centuries. </p><p>"I don't know," I admitted. "All I know is that I could not bring myself to it."</p><p>"A man who is afraid to end his life should not then beg another to kill him in mercy," she said, as absolute and unwavering as justice. </p><p>I had begged Thranduil. He had granted me mercy's ending.</p><p>"Rise," commanded Artanis. </p><p>I hastily obeyed. I was taller than her, stronger than her, and yet I felt minuscule before her flaying gaze. </p><p>"I cannot forgive you," she said plainly. "You acted foolishly in deliberation and we would have lost all if not for Thranduil. Your spite for a man you did not understand nearly saw us undone."</p><p>She had not changed, hiding her personal griefs behind the abstraction of their cause. Then, she sighed and continued, "Be well, Telpë. Perhaps you shall find a modicum of understanding one day for the choices he and I made. It does not matter to me." </p><p>That was her way, to absolve herself of interest in seeking another's approval, even if all her life she had valued herself by her father's approval and then her husband's. <em>It does not matter to me</em>, she had said time and time again, and wept alone afterwards. </p><p>I went to seek Macalaurë.</p><p>"Yes, Telpë?" He asked absently, immersed in his reading. </p><p>"I think Artanis could use your company." </p><p>He looked up at me then, concerned. </p><p>"What did you do?"</p><p>"Nothing." </p><p>And wasn't that the crux of it? I had not acted to take my life. And she would never forgive me for it, for what my decision had cost her. </p><p>The rulers of our family had veered between retribution and restoration. Grandfather, Nolofinwë, and Findekáno had sought retribution. Ereinion and Turkáno had sought restoration. At the crossing of their philosophies, as chiasmus, remained Artanis, absolute in her sense of justice. Mercy was not her way. </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>"Grandfather?"</p><p>He hid his surprise fairly well. I had not approached him of my volition before.</p><p>"Did I interrupt you?"</p><p>He shook his head, though I could easily see he had been deep in contemplation as he reviewed his calculations for something or the other. In the past, he would have harshly chided me for breaking his concentration. </p><p>"Why did Nolofinwë forgive you?" </p><p>There was no surprise on his features. Sighing, he patted the workbench he was perched on. I sat beside him, as I once had in Tirion. I had cherished those moments as a child, pressed close to him, listening to him speak of each step as he worked through the day. The scent of him was a familiar and old comfort, of beeswax and metal and forge fire.  When his hand came to enfold me hesitantly, I clasped it in mine. </p><p>He began to speak of his work of the day, walking me through the calculations step by step, ruminating aloud on the tradeoffs between this metal or that, lamenting the work of his apprentices, and I pretended along that all was as had once been. </p><p>"Nolofinwë is not Artanis," he said finally. "He takes after his mother. Artanis takes after hers."</p><p>Earwen of Alqualondë had not forgiven. </p><p>After Maitimo, she had been the first to commit suicide in our family. She had taken her life before her father's throne, when her daughter had returned to Valinor. With her death, she had given Artanis a crown and an army.</p><p>"She won't forgive me, will she?" </p><p>"No."</p><p>Grandfather had never been one to hide the truth. <br/>
 <br/>
"She will love you nevertheless," he promised soothingly. </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p><strong>Asterism</strong> </p><p><br/>
 <br/>
On my way back from an errand to the village, I crossed paths with Macalaurë in the woods.</p><p>He was walking alone. </p><p>It had been his custom, in Tirion, in Formenos, on Arda.</p><p>He could spend hours alone, with his thoughts, as he traipsed through the woods. Once, we had teased him for his uncivilized Sindarin pursuit. He had scornfully said that the Sindar must have learned it from him.  </p><p>Nolofinwë had chided him often when we dwelled in the encampments by the Mithrim, saying that he might find himself lost. Macalaurë had the preternatural sense of a homing pigeon, unerring in making his way home, regardless of where he wandered.</p><p>He had loved the still, glacial lakes and mountainous terrain of Himring the most, despite his incessant complaints about Maitimo's lands. He had waxed eloquent in his letters to the rest of us, whenever he had written of his walks in those woods of winter. </p><p>He kept his rites and rituals in this new world. Change was a constant, they said. He had not paid mind to them. </p><p>He slowed his pace to let me catch up. We walked in silence. Macalaurë was not given to aimless conversation. There was a rough-carved dagger at his waist, I noticed then.</p><p>"Not of our make," I remarked, curious.  </p><p>"A gift from Húrin," he replied laconically, elaborating no more. </p><p>Húrin and Macalaurë, wonder of wonders, had become excellent friends. I had feared that Macalaurë might treat him poorly, as he had treated Findekáno or Círdan. </p><p>Perhaps the combined appeals of Turkáno and Maitimo had thawed him to Húrin. I doubted it. Since when had Macalaurë been reasonable on this matter? It must be Húrin's nature that had endeared him to Macalaurë. </p><p>"How did you forgive him?" I asked finally. </p><p>He glanced askance at me.  </p><p>"For infidelity," I clarified. </p><p>A peculiar expression crossed his face. He was amused, I realized. Lightly, he said, "I blame Nolofinwë's slipshod virtues for how he turned out. You and I seem ruined by my father's tutelage on the matter."</p><p><em>Give the heart before you give the flesh</em>, Grandfather had told me often, as he had tried to teach all of us. Most of us had faithfully held to this, from Artanis and Irissë to my father and his brothers, to Turkáno.</p><p>Nolofinwë had neatly separated the matters of the flesh from the matters of the heart. Sleeping with half our army required compartmentalization, clearly.  Findekáno had taken after him. </p><p>Maitimo had been an odd duck. He had not been given to blind pleasure-seeking  in brothels or in the barracks.</p><p>"Findaráto told me about Melyanna and Elwë," Macalaurë said thoughtfully. "Both of them had taken many lovers among their courtiers. Each man or woman they took to their bed, they loved truly. When they moved on to the next, there was no bitterness in parting."</p><p>"Elwë did not take another lover after Findaráto."</p><p>"Best-laid plans and all that," Macalaurë said, amused. "I doubt Elwë knew what to expect of a scion of Finwë." </p><p>Findaráto had emulated Nolofinwë in this brave, new world, working his way through men and orgies as if he might run out of time. Perhaps that was his way to forget. Hadn't once Findekáno done the same in Barad Eithel?</p><p>Carnistro had not taken a lover after the death of Haleth. Irissë was the only one Tyelko had touched. My father and Turkáno remained loyal to each other.    Ereinion had not strayed after his marriage, despite the many nobles and commoners who had attempted to seduce the king. </p><p>"You take after Maitimo," Macalaurë remarked. </p><p>Riled by the comparison, I scowled at him. </p><p>"You took Ereinion to bed to show him he was loved."</p><p>"He spent a lifetime thinking himself misbegotten and unloved," I defended. I had merely wanted to provide the lad he had been a semblance of family and affection. </p><p>"There was no need to bed him, was there?"</p><p>I frowned. "It was the currency that he understood best," I said hesitantly, seeing where Macalaurë was heading with this line of conversation. </p><p>"I imagine it was also the currency Túrin understood best," Macalaurë commented, cutting as ever, sparing me nothing. "And it was the currency Elured's daughter understood too, clearly." </p><p>I said nothing, rather ashamed of how I had phrased my explanation. </p><p>"It was the currency you knew best," he summarized concisely. </p><p>"Perhaps," I allowed, unwilling to refute him when I knew instinctively that he was right. </p><p>"Maitimo was no different. He could not give his heart or mind in whole, not when he loved me from breath to death, not when his mind held a conjurer's secrets. So he gave himself in the ways that remained, as best as he knew to give." He raised an eyebrow when I met his gaze. "Rather presumptuous of you to judge him for a practice you had in common, wouldn't you say?"</p><p>I shook my head. That had not been my intent. I had wanted to know how Macalaurë had come to terms with it, for it was clear that he no longer held old grudges on this matter. </p><p>"I merely seek to know how you judged it," I said, knowing that Macalaurë would not mind my forthrightness. </p><p>He had no patience for beating about the bush. He had no qualms in answering plain, if tactless questions. He was as Findekáno when it came to this. <em>I award honesty. Rhetoric can find another to appeal to</em>, he had said once, when Findaráto had teased him about it. </p><p>"I came to see that it was not my place to judge," he replied. "It took me his death and millennia alone; I suppose some take longer to meander to wisdom than others. My understanding of love was passionate monogamy. His understanding was that of the thrall, the knave and the knight. Bless him for that. It saved us, in the end. And I, for one, am glad for every breath I draw under sunless skies, so that I may love him without fearing for him." </p><p>He smiled at me thinly. </p><p>"My life was my deathwatch for him once. I had begun to mourn him long before he had died. I had burned, everyday, for his sake, to hold him together mind to flesh, anchoring him with my facade of nonchalance and optimism. <em>I need only my Macalaurë</em>, he had said so often. I endeavored to be that to him, calm in the face of all things. I succeeded. Afterwards, I was a shell, not because I grieved him anew, but because I had exhausted myself to cinders. My father poured his soul into the Silmarilli once. I had poured mine into my brother."</p><p>We had reached our courtyard. </p><p>"I cannot ask for more. I have everything I need," he said, in a tone of finality. </p><p>"You have him," I said softly. </p><p>"Yes," he allowed. "I have my family, and my freedom."</p><p>Macalaurë, for all his disdain, had been as Nolofinwë. Through strife, through death, through doom, until his brother's dying day, he had written to all of us, regularly and without rancor. His letters had held us together, as once Nolofinwë's had. He had written even to Ereinion continually, despite his scorn for Findekáno's misbegotten sprog.   </p><p>He had not written a single letter after Maitimo's death. He had given his brother whatever he could, including holding our family together as Nolofinwë had. </p><p>I was wrong to think that he had not changed. He had silently and without prompting become at various times and turns whatever Maitimo needed, an anchor from start to end. </p><p>Artanis had kept faith. Macalaurë too had done the same, in his customary plain manner without telling anyone of it, effortlessly and silently. I had begged for death's ending, after mere centuries in captivity and torment. Macalaurë had patiently waited out millennia, alone, voiceless, keeping his faith in a dead man.   </p><p>"You loved him in absoluteness, Macalaurë. I wish I had been loved so, at least once," I confessed. </p><p>Túrin had loved me, but he had not set aside his wars for me. Loriel had loved me, but she had not been willing to choose me over her people. </p><p>"Oh, my love is hardly the feat you make it to be," Macalaurë said, laughing. "Telpë, after what he has done in my name, love is the least of it."</p><p>In his name, Maitimo had ruptured fate's threads, had cast down the Gods, and had spawned creation under sunless skies. </p><p>Perhaps love was indeed the least of it.<br/>
 </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>"Come fishing with me!" </p><p>"You are terrible at fishing," I told Ereinion. </p><p>"I am better at fishing than I am at hunting," Ereinion promised. </p><p>The outdoors hated him. He had inherited Turkáno's inexplicable ineptness when it came to the beasts and the birds. The eagles had been the only ones that had loved Turkáno. </p><p>Turkáno held that he was a better huntsman than Ereinion. He was right, I thought, but at least he had spent his youth under the skies of Formenos with his siblings and cousins. </p><p>Ereinion was learning these skills for the first time. He had feared being seen as unsophisticated once. Celeborn was renowned for his hunting exploits. Elrond had learned from Macalaurë. Gildor had learned from the Edain he had wandered with. Laurefindë had taught my family once. Ereinion had shied away from being seen as less capable, when it came to the courtly pursuits of hunting or lore. In his time, the Noldor court came to see hunting as a bucolic affair best left to the uncivilized Sindar realms of Lorien and Greenwood.   </p><p>Grandfather and Findekáno had worn away Ereinion's fears of being seen as unworthy. He had allowed Findekáno to teach him the pursuits of our family. He rolled his eyes and endured good-naturedly the teasing about his pisspoor success at these activities. </p><p>Remarkable, what the conviction of belonging does to one. </p><p>"Come, please!" He was insisting. "Grandfather means to hold a demonstration for his apprentices. You know how that goes!"</p><p>Grandfather would be annoyed by their inability to keep up with him. He would endeavor to stay patient, only to lose his temper with florid words and passionate ennui as he railed at the merciless universe that had given him these mediocre minds to mould. His lamentations on the matter had not changed from the first time I had seen him teach in Tirion. He would then scowl and sulk through dinner, before forgetting all about his displeasure on the morrow. His ability to remember anything outside his work was abysmal.  </p><p>"Very well," I told Ereinion. "Let us feed Artanis."</p><p>"She complained about the carp I caught last time. She said it was as eating a boiled hag's cunt."</p><p>I grinned at that colorful description. Artanis had never lacked for morbid metaphors. While she had censored herself greatly among her husband's people, she had been gleefully gruesome in her phrasing among her own family. </p><p>"She prefers perch," I confided. </p><p>"And oysters above all!" He sighed. </p><p>He had a phobia when it came to diving in running water. One of these days, I would have to convince him that he would not drown. Perhaps I should leave the exercise to Findekáno. He had taken to coaxing Ereinion into new adventures. I had often enjoyed Findekáno's company in my youth. He had been easygoing and audacious. He had allowed me to try daring feats that Grandfather or my parents would have chided me for. </p><p>"Woolgathering?" Ereinion asked, fetching bait and tackle and rods, chivvying me riverwards. </p><p>Findaráto was chasing a stablehand through the tall hyssops, laughing, as prelude to something else. He was quite fond of the luxuries of his quarters, but on occasion he could be convinced by a lover or two to venture to a liaison under the sky. </p><p>Artanis was sprawled upon a large rock, clad only in her chemise, and there were oyster shells scattered about her iridescent as flowers. Beside her, arguing with her, was Turkáno, robes hitched to his knees, Artanis's gown askew on his lap. They must be discussing their book. <br/>
 <br/>
Underneath a sprawling cedar, Nolofinwë and Russandol were picnicking; I espied fruits and bread and caviar. Whenever one or the other was not called away to attend to administrative or logistical tasks, it was their routine to lunch by the river. </p><p>Ereinion dragged me to an outcropping. We perched at the edge and dangled our feet in the water. I waved him away before he could string the line to pole.  He waited patiently until I had readied his line. </p><p>"From the wrist," I told him, when he began flinging the line with an excess of energy and enthusiasm. </p><p>"It works just the same." </p><p>"How wasteful!" I lamented. </p><p>"Now you sound like Grandfather," he muttered. </p><p>Ereinion was lucky, even if he called himself perpetually unfortunate. He caught a perch. Artanis, bloodhound that she could be when it came to fresh catch, sat up on her rock. </p><p>"Is that a perch?" She demanded, as the fish struggled at the hook.  </p><p>"Is this a perch?" Ereinion turned to ask me, blissfully ignorant of freshwater species. He knew at least the fishes of the sea, thanks to Círdan's tutelage.  </p><p>I sighed and helped him reel it in, and began explaining to him how to mark the fish. <br/>
 <br/>
"I shall prepare this as a salted delicacy for you, Galadriel!" he called out. He was on a mission to convince us that salted fish tasted the best. We remained unconvinced. </p><p>"I shall salt you if you bloody dare tamper with my fish," she threatened. </p><p>Findaráto caught his paramour and was kissing him languidly, on a field of clover. Ereinion cleared his throat, blushing at the sight. He was prim. </p><p>"You should have seen Nolofinwë in Tirion," I told him, to worsen his discomposure. "There wasn't a man in the barracks that he missed sampling." </p><p>"Cease your slander!" Ereinion hissed, utterly aghast at the image I drew.<br/>
 <br/>
"Oh, he fucked anything in armor," Turkáno said wryly. </p><p>"Anything with a cock," Artanis chimed in. </p><p>"He went to Valmar to arrange Maitimo's betrothal to Ingwe's granddaughter," Turkáno began. </p><p>"And slept with Ingwe and his son on consecutive nights," Artanis completed. </p><p>"He seduced Findekáno's lovers right from Findekáno's bed!" Turkáno continued merrily, laughing at Ereinion's scandalized face. </p><p>"And he slept his way through Fëanáro's apprentices until Fëanáro moved his forge to Formenos," Artanis added. </p><p>"He slept with Arafinwë's theatre boys."</p><p>"He slept with every courtier in Olwë's palace." </p><p>"He slept with his wife's brother." </p><p>"He slept with his brother." </p><p>"Enough!" Ereinion insisted, harassed. </p><p>"Well, it turned out to be enough," Artanis admitted.  </p><p>"Yes, Fëanáro wore him out," Turkáno said wickedly. </p><p>"Turned him a family man," Artanis said, mirthful. </p><p>"It only takes a brother," Turkáno joined in. </p><p>"I am very glad I don't have any," Ereinion muttered. </p><p>"Oh, there were plenty," Turkáno informed him bluntly. "Maitimo tracked down the primmest one."</p><p>"You should have seen him in Lindon, batting away maidens and soldiers, solemn-faced and dutiful," Artanis told Turkáno.  </p><p>"Nothing happened!" Ereinion exclaimed. "They were merely misguided."</p><p>"You have Findekáno's form and face. Nobody could resist my brother," Turkáno retorted. "Arafinwë tried to seduce him for years."</p><p>"Arafinwë?" I asked, surprised. Arafinwë had liked his lovers cherubic and excelling at the theatre. Findekáno, handsome as he was, did not have those traits. </p><p>"I hosted a feast for him," Ereinion remarked. "He said that Earendil had my father's form and face. He invited me to play darts with him." </p><p>"My father was fond of his pederasty," Artanis said, laughing. </p><p>"I was a King," Ereinion said dryly. "Hardly a stablehand come fresh of age." </p><p>"You were fresh-faced and gullible," I teased Ereinion. He scowled and waved his perch at me to demonstrate how clever and skilled he truly was. </p><p>Artanis's peals of laughter at his antics resounded over the river's merry song. About her neck shone resplendent the necklace Grandfather had crafted, opaline asteriated by the gem I had prospected by the lake. </p><p>I swallowed my fear and asked her, "May I fetch you oysters?" </p><p>"Yes, please," she said graciously, and my heart found its level.</p><p>It was not forgiveness, but it was eden all the same.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>I returned late from the forge, having stayed to help Grandfather with woodworking. He had waved me off when I had yawned, absorbed in his craft. Knowing that he would not leave it half-done, I had wished him good night and left him to it. </p><p>There were torches in the library and yet I heard no rustling of parchment nor the scratch of a quill. I decided to check if the fires were grated. </p><p>Curled in Turkáno's armchair with a tome pressed to his chest lay asleep Maitimo. There was an ugly misshapen lump of wool at his feet. Turkáno must have lifted him to the comfort of the chair and covered him with the blanket before retiring to his bed. </p><p>Knowing how restless he had been in sleep once, I hesitated to leave him so close to the hearth. Turkáno had mastered the art of lifting him and moving about without waking him. They kept company together into the late night often, one reading to the other. Macalaurë, whatever his virtues were, was not one for excessive socialization. My father preferred the games and follies Irissë hosted in the evenings to the quiet of the library. </p><p>I stood five feet away and called his name. Once, he had not taken kindly to anyone that touched him while he slept. </p><p>"Telpë?" He asked, eyes closed, voice a mellow wisp. </p><p>"Smelled the grease of the forge, did you?" I asked wryly. </p><p>"I know your steps," he murmured, mostly asleep, languid in repose.  </p><p>This was the root of my resentments, of my self-loathing, of my unwillingness to forgive him. He did not have Artanis's sense of justice. He did not judge, instead using disarming truth as the means to force others to judge themselves. </p><p>It was the way of the Maiar, Artanis had often complained.</p><p><em>"What must I do?</em>" a vassal would ask Melyanna in the court of Doriath.</p><p><em>"What must you do?"</em> she would ask in turn, coaxing the vassal to think for himself.</p><p>"You should make for your bed," I told him quietly. </p><p>"Macalaurë rode to the eastern villages with Findaráto," he said, his diction loosened even more by sleep. </p><p>His speech, Grandfather had often lamented, had been all wrong for one of the Noldor. Grandfather had blamed the series of Vanyarin lovers Nolofinwë had entertained during Maitimo's childhood for his peculiar enunciation. Artanis claimed that he spoke our mother tongue as the Maiar did, after her first visit to Doriath where she had heard Melyanna speak. Mairon had spoken in our accent and dialect, but that must have been since he had been once apprenticed to Aulë. Maitimo's accent, in matters of diplomacy or war, had crisply matched Nolofinwë's. It was only in the company of family that he slipped and lapsed into his quaint enunciation, with softened vowels and blurred sing-song consonants.<br/>
 <br/>
In my quiet musing, I had not noticed him blink his eyes open. Starspun, Macalaurë had once sung, to describe that peculiar grey. Irissë's son had made swords and gates from meteorites, and the heavy dark of them was entirely dissimilar to Maitimo's perspicacious gaze.  </p><p>After his death, Ereinion, Elros, and Elrond had commissioned statues and paintings. Try as we might, we had been unable to capture his eyes in stone or wood or oil; we had succeeding in portraying neither the wistful loveliness of  when he was moved to compassion or the fell, white fire that blazed when he chose ruthlessness. </p><p>"You ought to make for bed," I insisted, when I saw a measure of lucidity in him.</p><p>He would fall asleep in the alcoves of our courtyards and gardens in Formenos, when he returned late from his errands as an emissary for Finwë. Hesitant to wake the household, he would settle for the night outside. Given to waking late as he was, Grandfather and I would inevitably find him asleep when we were making his way to the forge. How many times had Grandfather sighed and removed his cloak or overrobes to drape gently over his son? </p><p>Nolofinwë accused Grandfather of not loving his children enough. Before the Silmarilli, Grandfather had loved us as he could, clumsily and sternly. Turkáno had taken after him in this, and Itarillë had not loved him for it. </p><p>Nolofinwë had stood by the Mithrim, gathering the children of his brothers to him, and vowed that he would be the father that neither a coward nor a madman could be to them. He had kept his promise. In his footsteps, Macalaurë had followed, and had kept the same promise to Elrond and Elros. Little wonder that Ereinion had resented them once.</p><p>Maitimo shifted to tug up Turkáno's blanket to his waist. In a gesture that had come easily once, I tutted and went over to him to place my palm over his forehead. He was warm and blessedly well. His eyelashes brushed against my hand. Towards the end, his eyelashes had begun falling out. Well-formed, they had called him, mocking, but he had not lamented his rapid physical deterioration. <em>It is as well that Findekáno is dead</em>, Macalaurë had written to me. Findekáno would have bitterly wept if he had seen the sight. </p><p>There were faint bruises about his neck. I gasped, reminded of another time, of Formenos, when Morgoth had come to claim the Silmarilli, when Maitimo had faced him across Finwë's corpse. I had saved him that night. We had not spoken of it afterwards. I had buried that secret, frightened, and even in Túrin I had not confided of my crime.  </p><p>I had not known what else to do, with Morgoth's gauntlet about Maitimo's throat. I had not known what to do after I had saved him. <em>Onwards. Ever onwards</em>, Maitimo had told me sternly, pulling me together, sending me to Alqualondë, where my mother had fallen to a Telerin sword, where Artanis killed her grandfather to save her father, where Grandfather trembled in Nolofinwë's arms, mad and desperate. </p><p>"With me, now," Maitimo said softly, fully awake. I shook my head, frightened, overwhelmed by memories. I bit my lips, forcing myself not to cry, forcing myself not to spill ancient griefs he had forgotten. </p><p>Maitimo had not moved from his repose. He extended an arm, his left, and caught my right hand in his. I flinched. Amused exasperation crossed his features, but he said nothing and dragged my hand to him, to his breast, and placed it over his heart. It beat strong, rhythmic, blessedly regular. I sobbed and fell to my knees, burying my face in the front of his robes, pressing my hand flush against that thrum of life.   </p><p>He had done the same, at Formenos, in death's dark after Morgoth had left. He had done the same, at Alqualondë, after my mother's death. He had done the same, when he had returned from Angband and I had been inconsolably fraught. He had done the same, one final time, when he had saved me from Elured. <em>“What will you do after we are gone, Telpë?</em>” he had asked, weighed down, dull and sad, worn to the soul. His heart had been spasmodic and faint. It was the last time he had embraced me. I had cut ties and taken myself away afterwards, promising myself a life away from the doom that haunted my family.    </p><p>"How did I wrong you?" He asked finally, when I flinched as his hand came to cup my shoulder. </p><p>He wanted to live in his brave, new world, in the lethe Artanis had carven for him. He meant to hear my grief, I realized painfully. He was not given to impulsiveness. He had decided to offer me the chance to speak, even if it would force him to know what he would rather not.  </p><p>How many times had our family lamented his lack of care for self? He had finally changed, if only by dissociation, to come to be kind to that wretched prince whose skin he lived in. </p><p>I would not have him hear my tale. He had come so far. Let him be.<br/>
 <br/>
"You did not wrong me," I said, truthful. </p><p>He frowned at me, unconvinced. I thumbed away sleep's rheum from the corners of his eyes.  </p><p>"I am not an invalid," he informed me, tolerating my touch with good grace.</p><p>He had been. Macalaurë had nursed him to his death. I had abandoned them, thinking that I had saved myself. Ereinion had been baffled by my reluctance to visit them. King at war he had been, and he had still frequently made trips to see them. </p><p>My hand slipped to his neck, where I had glimpsed bruises when the collar of his robes had shifted. </p><p>"I cannot remember if you have cause to worry," he said apologetically, good-humored, eyes sparkling as the asteriated gems that Grandfather had shaped for Artanis. He drew down the fabric to expose the bruising. "Let me reassure you that these are only skin-deep, and a product of delightful play."</p><p>Túrin had been profligate. He had seduced men and women for utilitarian purpose. Living as he had, without recourse to family or wealth, he had prioritized his survival above all. Even he, however, had not embraced Maitimo's vices. </p><p><em>Have you encountered these games of power in intimacy</em>? I had asked once, curious.</p><p><em>Ah, those are the provenance of the High-King and his catamite</em>,  Túrin had said, laughing. </p><p>Rumors had followed both Findekáno and Maitimo, from Mereth Aderthad to their deaths, of how Maitimo had been unmanned in Angband, of how he had become Findekáno's plaything. After Findekáno's death, after beholding how Maitimo mourned, theirs had become a tale extolled as the epitome of love on Arda, rivaling even the tale of Beren and Luthien.   </p><p>Macalaurë had found the entirety of their canon as sung in lore tiresome and vexing and <em>false</em>.</p><p>"I wish you had more commonplace vices," I muttered, running my eyes over the marks to verify that they were merely skin-deep. He had spoken honestly. </p><p>"Findaráto assures me that my vices are mundane," Maitimo replied, gracing me with a chipper smile.</p><p>"Findaráto considers four insufficient in a night," I commented, daring to brush away the coils of tangled hair from his brow. </p><p>"To each his own," he said absently, as he brought the edge of his sleeve to wipe away the tear tracks from my face, watching me carefully if I might flinch. I did not. </p><p>"Ereinion calls Fëanáro Grandfather," I said softly. </p><p>"Yes," he said, diverted from his perusal. "What of it?"</p><p>"What of you?" I asked, regretting the forlornness that touched him briefly on hearing my words, before he let his customary veil of dispassion conceal. </p><p>"As Ereinion wills," he said, clement.   </p><p>I turned to depart, but he asked then, "What of you, Telpë? What shall you have of me?"</p><p>I knelt before him once again, and confessed. "All my life, I was taught that silver cannot outshine gold, try as it might."</p><p>His gaze was a perspicuous thing, flaying and soothing in turn.</p><p>"I feared you. I feared for you. I loved you. I did not understand you. I pitied you. I envied you." I smiled, shaking my head in deprecation. "And I was proud of you, Maitimo. I am proud of you."</p><p>"Why?" he asked softly.</p><p>"Why?" I took his hand in mine. "You showed me that silver can outshine gold, that it was worthy, that it was no poor man's consolation." </p><p>His smile was a swift, shy thing. My thumb chased it across his fire-warmed skin. His fingers curled about mine.</p><p>He did not flinch, and neither did I.</p><p>I covered him with that misshapen woolen blanket of many colors, and sang him to sleep, with songs of beatus.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p>
  <strong>Electrum</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>I was teaching Ereinion to mark loam by the proportion of silt and clay, in the vegetable beds that he wanted to grow carrots in. </p><p>"How do you know this?" He asked, impressed by my knowledge. </p><p>It was delightfully easy to impress him with the bucolic, child of cities that he was. </p><p>"The composition of soil matters to pottery," I said, grinning. "I am no gardener."</p><p>"Neither am I," he said, worried, as he looked over the fallow fields. </p><p>"You mean to impress Maitimo with your newfound vegetable farming skills," I teased him. </p><p>"I ought to have delegated to someone who knows, and claimed my victory at harvest's table."</p><p>"Artanis has been advising you, I see." </p><p>He shrugged. </p><p>Then, he asked in a tentative tone, "Will it be of note?" </p><p>"Nobody in our family shares his agrarian joys. He shall be ecstatic," I said honestly. "Ereinion, you needn't strive to please. You are enough."</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Supper was an uproarious affair, since Nolofinwë and Grandfather had made truce after their latest falling out. It left Nolofinwë in most benevolent cheer. </p><p>"Access to endless sex suits you, Nolofinwë," Findaráto teased. </p><p>"Mind your tongue! We have guests!" Nolofinwë chided.</p><p>"It is only Húrin," Artanis protested. "He does not mind." </p><p>"Stop speaking for others, Artanis," Turkáno argued. "Húrin, my apologies for my truculent troll-mannered cousin."</p><p>"He eats mash!" Tyelko cut in. "Surely that is the manner of trolls too!"</p><p>"We stuff his larder with game in the vain hope he might feed himself better!" Irissë exclaimed. </p><p>"I am right here," Húrin said evenly, minding the gaggle not at all. </p><p>"Now you know what it means to live with them," Findekáno offered peaceably. </p><p>He was the only one at our table to veer away from the wine. On rare occasions, he would choose watered down mead to join us in celebrations. Maitimo often brewed fermented cordials that he then filtered out the alcohol from to serve at our table, for Findekáno's sake. </p><p>"I know what it means to live with them," Húrin rejoined. "They make themselves home under my roof and eat my pumpkins while loudly loathing my poor mash."</p><p>"You cannot cook to save your life," Turkáno explained. </p><p>"I had a solution," Húrin said, laughing. "I had hired a cook."</p><p>"And paid him in cock," Findaráto noted solemnly, eyes bright in mischief. </p><p>"It was very good cock," Maitimo opined. </p><p>"It cannot compare to Laurefindë's," Nolofinwë declared. </p><p>"I am surprised you remember. You trawled through the cocks of Tirion without learning their names," Grandfather said tartly. </p><p>"If it had mattered, I would have remembered. They were merely sustenance until I had what I wanted," Nolofinwë promised, brilliantly seductive when he chose to be. Grandfather fell silent. </p><p>"Unremarkable, and yet nourishing. As mash?" Macalaurë asked brightly.</p><p>"As mash," Nolofinwë concurred. </p><p>"You do cock an injustice by comparing it to that flavorless, odorless, textureless potato gruel Húrin calls mash!" Artanis cut in. </p><p>"You are scarring Ereinion," Grandfather pointed out. </p><p>Ereinion was blushing, horrified, scandalized, and I despaired for him. Sure enough, Findaráto was laughing, and Artanis had opened her mouth for the next quip. </p><p>"No heckling at my table, Artanis!" Nolofinwë demanded. </p><p>"Tyranny, here is thy face," Artanis retorted. </p><p>"Tyranny's face was Macalaurë. He made one of our maids cry today," Maitimo remarked. "I shall have to find yet another to tend our quarters." </p><p>"She stole my pillow," Macalaurë said wryly, to resounding laughter at the table. </p><p>"Pillows?" Findekáno asked, surprised, looking to Maitimo. At times as this, I could not help but remember that they had known each other so well once. </p><p>"The perils of cohabitation," Maitimo said, forbearing. "He invaded my quarters with twelve pillows. They shed goosefeathers everywhere."</p><p>"I prefer my orgies to be attended by the living," Findaráto said. "However, I suppose Macalaurë has always been drawn to the inanimate. Turkáno, do you remember that harp we caught him with in Tirion?"</p><p>"It was Findekáno's harp," Turkáno reminisced. </p><p>"I was oiling the harp!" Macalaurë protested. "The wood had dried out!"</p><p>"Oh, Findekáno, how could you leave your wood to dry?" Artanis exclaimed.</p><p>"T'was hope that oiled my harp," Findekáno elucidated, his tone coyly salacious. </p><p>"Refrain! Let us spare Ereinion!" Maitimo intervened. </p><p>Ereinion had his ears covered with his palms, exasperated and utterly embarrassed. </p><p>"Reconsidering your potent desire for family?" I teased him. </p><p>"Are all families as this?" He demanded. </p><p>"This is the only one I have had the misfortune of knowing," I said, laughing, raising my wine in toast to him. </p><p>"I suppose we shall have to make the best of it," he sighed. </p><p>"Oh, we will. I promise." </p><p>He grinned, drenched in happiness. Belonging had not suited another more.  <br/>
 </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>On my way to my quarters, I paused by one of the windows that opened out to the terrace overlooking the gardens. Night's grey washed its radiance over the cold flagstones and I was reminded of the many times when Mairon and I had walked together in Yavanna’s orchards in Tyelperion's light. </p><p>In an arbored alcove Maitimo and Macalaurë were speaking softly. </p><p>"Ereinion does not seem to fathom the truth," Maitimo was saying, pacing, restless. "He strives to please me. I require nothing of him but himself."</p><p>“Have you ever wanted to please a person so desperately that you might win his respect and matter to him?” Macalaurë asked him, from where he was seated upon an oaken bench in the shade of a rose-laden trellis. </p><p>Maitimo laughed, as if amused by the irony of the words. Shaking his head, overwhelmed, he knelt before his brother. </p><p>"You know my truth," he said plainly, happily, yielding when Macalaurë's hand came to pull him into a soft kiss. </p><p>"Let Ereinion strive to please. It is how he loves. I shan't fault him for it."</p><p>"And I?" </p><p>"You shall endure it with grace." Macalaurë laughed. "It is what you have always done."</p><p>"I should have drawn the line at salted fish."</p><p>"You have had worse," Macalaurë promised. </p><p>A hand wound into mine, thin and warm. Artanis. I exhaled when she placed her head on my shoulder. </p><p>"I am glad that you kept faith," I admitted to her. "Only you could have won us this." </p><p>She said nothing, unusually content, letting me hold her in peace. </p><p>"Tell me your secrets," Maitimo asked Macalaurë, kneeling still, voice lilting in ardent fondness. </p><p>"Which of them shall I give you tonight?" Macalaurë wondered. </p><p>"A precious one."</p><p>"Then have the most precious one of all," Macalaurë offered. "In Formenos, on a night as this, I came to you. You placed your weary head on my lap, worried from your negotiations that had gone awry in Valmar. I desperately wished that I could take your cares and keep you safe as mine." </p><p>"My constant heart, then and now," Maitimo murmured, and the keening affection in his tone was stark. </p><p>"We spoke of love. I thought you waited for another." Macalaurë sighed. "Your convoluted manner of seeking to speak of it went awry, just as your negotiations in Valmar had. It was not until Artanis's victory that I realized that it had been a confession." </p><p>"And you blamed me for your inability to realize this before, I daresay." </p><p>"Oh, but you were a confounding, utterly beloved creature that I could not fathom."</p><p>"I saved you from a dragon. It was as blatant a confession as any. Should I have stripped instead?"</p><p>"I wanted both," Macalaurë managed; his peals of laughter resounded through the courtyard. </p><p>"Greedy brother." </p><p>"Utterly so. Now tell me one of your secrets."</p><p>"Oh, I have none left." </p><p>"Have another of mine, then," Macalaurë said. "I have finally worked out how you contrived to bring me here without letting me enter the Void." </p><p>"It must be love, they say." </p><p>"Love was the least of it," Macalaurë declared. "It was sacrifice."</p><p>Maitimo said nothing. </p><p>"You knew," Macalaurë accused, torn between awe and anger. </p><p>"I hoped."</p><p>"You hoped?" </p><p>"It is what I would have done too, if I had been in the place of that wretched prince that loved you." </p><p>"Dissociation again, brother mine?"</p><p>"I find it easier," Maitimo admitted. "The cruelties he knew, the cruelties he wrought; I cannot imagine what must have driven one once as I am to those extrema."</p><p>Macalaurë sighed and kissed him once more, before saying quietly, "You my hallowed providence, of then and now." </p><p>In the grey of the night, thin in the torchlight, he held with gentle care the thrall that had felled Gods for him. </p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Ereinion was waiting in the corridor before my doors. I let him in. Before I could lead him to an armchair by the fire, he had handed me a poorly wrapped parcel. I opened it to find a timekeeper. In its little gears and knobs, I could see the tell-tale mark of Grandfather's tutelage. Rough in its form it was, unlike Grandfather's fine-detailed work. Ereinion had the makings of a craftsman. I cherished this; I had now a companion in the forge.</p><p>"Do you know this metal?"</p><p>I brought it to the light, to scrutinize. "Electrum," I remarked, surprised. </p><p>The only naturally occurring alloy of gold and silver. Greengold, Narvi's people had called it. It had been the metal of their coinage.</p><p>It was not Grandfather's metal of choice. It was not my metal of choice. </p><p>"You told me of asterisms in gems, of how one crossed another. You told me of chiasmus in rhetoric." He took the timekeeper and placed it about my wrist, tightening the bracelet to flesh. "Promise me that you shan't compare silver to gold again."</p><p>"Ereinion-"</p><p>"You are enough."</p><p>His voice brooked no argument. Before me he stood, strong, stalwart, fierce in his demand, exuding the power he had once borne as the young king of a fallen people. On my wrist, time walked in a perfect circle, asteriated by my pulse. </p><p>"My King commands," I said, jesting, striving to divert him from his solemnity.</p><p>"Let this be the first of my commandments," Ereinion said, unyielding. "You are enough."</p><p>When I began to tremble, he came to enfold me in his embrace, without hesitation. His heart was strong as the electrum he had bound me in. And it roared to me his command again and again, unrelenting, indomitable, as it sung sweetly sacred carols of belonging. </p><p>There, under the aegis of another creation, mantled by the first of his commandments, I found my level.  </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p> <br/>Sunset is maintained at a <a href="https://the-song-of-sunset.dreamwidth.org">Dreamwidth repository</a>. It is a set of stories that can be read as standalone or as a full alternate universe.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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